Acknowledgements

In June 2019, a group of people assembled in Lethbridge, Canada, for a conference titled “The Line Crossed Us: New Directions in Critical Border Studies.” Many were based in the United States, and several more had travelled from overseas. Little could any of us have known that less than a year later, governments around the world would abruptly close their borders in response to a global pandemic, one that put an indefinite end to face-to-face gatherings of the sort from which this volume evolved. Seldom had the power of borders to separate been thrown into such high relief.

The conference that would soon seem so impossible originated in an email that Sheila had sent to Julie and Paul the previous year, welcoming two new border researchers to the University of Lethbridge and inviting us for coffee and a chat. We bonded around a sense that the broader field of critical border studies was ready for more transnational and transdisciplinary comparisons and collaborations where artists, activists, and academics work together to challenge border regimes. The Lethbridge Border Studies Group was born.

The conference that brought together the researchers in this collection was supported by individual research funds, including support from Julie’s Canada Research Chair in Critical Border Studies, and institutional support from the University of Lethbridge’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences, School of Graduate Studies, Office of Research and Innovation Services, Communications (especially Catharine Reader), Information Technology, and the facilities department. We also give our heartfelt thanks to the invaluable contributions of students Sydney Cabanas, Madeline Mendoza, and Seanna Uglem to organizing the 2019 conference and to Stephanie Laine Hamilton for her indispensable help in compiling this manuscript.